


Remember when Hawke...

by Solitae



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-09
Updated: 2018-09-09
Packaged: 2019-07-08 20:29:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15937715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Solitae/pseuds/Solitae
Summary: Isabela's pissed that Hawke got left in the Fade and decides to confront the Inquisitor.





	Remember when Hawke...

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't my canon for any world because I would never be able to leave a Hawke in the Fade that romanced Isabela. I can barely leave a Hawke I didn't like in the Fade. 
> 
> But this popped into my head during my current DAI playthrough and wouldn't let go, so here it is. I haven't been writing much lately, so be gentle with me. I felt like flexing my writing muscles a bit.

* * *

 

The hall was full for her judgement of Magister Erimond. The assault on Adamant had captured attention, and had, Deόiridh hoped, changed the view of the Inquisition from upstart order to force against chaos. Her pronouncement that he be sent to the Wardens had just passed her lips when she noticed a certain restlessness in far end of the hall. At her glance, Josephine simply shrugged and gave a barely perceptible shake of her head.

“GET OUT OF MY –“ The doors slammed open, their crack on the stone reverberating through the hall. “-WAY!” Two clerks tumbled into the foyer, their scrabbling on the floor audible in the sudden complete silence. Not an eye was on her now. The crowd began to part. Sounds resumed in the room with gasps and whispers quickly followed by the clatter of the guards’ weapons.

“Touch me, and I will geld you where you stand.” Deόiridh still couldn’t see the speaker, but she was filled with the certainty that the woman would do just that. Josephine took a step nearer.

“Stand down!” Leliana’s voice rang out. When had Leliana arrived? She rarely bothered with judgement days. And why would she intervene?

Deόiridh scarcely had time to wonder that before the crowd finished parting around an impressive woman in a fitted coat with an even more impressive admiral’s hat. “Admiral Isabela of the Waking Sea Raiders,” Josephine whispered into her ear. _Ah._

“You,” she hissed as she stalked toward the throne. Her weapons had not been secured before entering the hall Deόiridh realized as her stomach churned. “You _left_ Hawke in the Fade!”

Despite her insides suddenly turning to jelly, Deόiridh kept her voice level. “Serah Hawke volunteered to sacrifice herself so that-“

“ _Balls_ to that! _Balls_ to Hawke volunteering!” The woman’s sharp gold eyes locked on Deόiridh’s. “ _Balls_ to your appreciation of her sacrifice!” Her fury flooded the room, and the only sound was her boots on the floor as she stalked nearer. “After everything Hawke did. After Hawke came _back_ to help you fix your _shit_ , you _leave_ her there?”

The admiral’s hand shot over her shoulder to the hilt of one of her unsecured daggers, and instinctively, Deόiridh reached for her magic.

“I demand –“

“Rivaini!” Varric’s voice rang out as he stepped out of the crowd, landing within stabbing distance of the blade the pirate was still threatening to draw. “Don’t do something stupid, Rivaini.” It was as gentle as Deόiridh had ever heard his voice, and he laid his hand on the woman’s arm without hesitation.

It drew her attention off Deόiridh for a moment, and she managed to breathe again. Josephine’s fingers just barely brushed the back of her arm, out of sight of the gathered crowd.

“But _Hawke_ …” The pirate’s anger threatened to give way to something else.

“I know.” Varric kept his hand on the woman’s arm. “I know, but not here. Let’s go get a drink.”

She hesitated for a moment and shot Deόiridh another furious look before letting Varric lead her out. It was all Deόiridh could do not to shiver, and she was grateful when Josephine made a few closing remarks to the crowd, holding them long enough for Varric to get the woman across the yard but ending court for the day.

\-----------

Later that night, Deόiridh slipped into the back of the Herald’s Rest dressed as one of Leliana’s agents. Crowded as it was, Bull spotted her at once and waved her over. Wordlessly, she slumped down next to him.

Varric was still at the bar with Isabela, both of them deep in their cups and talking loudly. They’d gained a few others in their immediate circle and a good portion of the tavern was listening to them. Most surprising was Leliana perched on the bar near them, actually giggling at some story the blond tattooed elf next to Isabela had just told.

“And then there was the time Hawke tried to bring home a dragonling!” Isabela slurred with a laugh. “Did I ever tell you about that, Zev?”

The elf laughed and rested his hand on the small of the pirate’s back in an unmistakeably protective gesture. “Hawke herself did! She was furious with you, Varric, for preventing her.”

Varric pounded his fist on the bar as he laughed. “Well, shit, we couldn’t have her burning down all of Lowtown!”

“And she would have!” Isabela chortled.

“ _I_ knew Hawke before she was Hawke,” Leliana started loftily, her accent more pronounced than usual. “Did she ever tell you about the time she crashed through the revered mother’s window?”

There was a chorus of nos, and for an instant, Deόiridh saw the storyteller that Leliana was, weaving a tale that set the whole tavern laughing.

Cullen and several of the templars wandered in during the story, and it was only when Varric invited them to join that she recalled that many of the templars knew Hawke too. 

Bull glanced at her and shoved a mug of ale into her hands. “Better drink if you’re going to stay.”

As yet another round of “Remember when Hawke…” started, the walls seemed to close around her. With a shake of her head, she shoved out of her seat and escaped up through the Herald’s Rest out onto the ramparts.

It was blessedly quiet, the laughter from the tavern now at an appropriate distance. She couldn’t join in their grief or their laughter. Hawke had only been at Skyfall briefly, and Deόiridh had been too busy making sure it didn’t fall down around them to get to know her.

“You okay, boss?”

Bull’s rumble startled her out of her thoughts, and she looked up with a weak smile. “I’ll survive.”

“You want me to hit you with a stick? Figure I owe you.”

She laughed despite herself. “I don’t think that’ll help.”

He waggled his eyebrows at her and grinned. “You never know.”

Deόiridh just shook her head and leaned on his arm a little, gratefully accepting the mug of ale this time. Bull, thankfully, was content to provide her silent support as she slowly drained the mug. Together they simply watched the approach and the mountains around them as the night air cleared her thoughts.

“Hawke makes them …people again,” she finally whispered. “Leliana, Cullen, even Varric. Varric tries with me, but there’s this …wall.” Her eyes prickled. “Don’t get me wrong. I care about them all. I’d go the ends of creation to help them, and I know they’re giving me everything they’ve got. But…”

“But?”

Deόiridh’s lips worked for a moment. “I guess I wonder what stories they’ll tell when I’m gone.” She shook her head quickly. “It’s stupid.”

“Naw, it’s not stupid. And honestly? They’ll tell the same sort of crap. That’s the shit you remember when someone dies.” He continued despite her doubtful noise. “Josephine will tell everyone about the time you nearly fought a duel for her and shouted that you loved her. Sera will talk about how you were scared of spiders and how you pranked Cullen.” He nudged her shoulder gently. “And I’ll talk about how you gave me sexual pleasure by letting me kill a dragon.”

Her own choked laugh startled Deόiridh, and she mopped at her cheeks. “Promise?”

“Promise.”

\-----------

A few days later, they received a report of a rift on the Storm Coast with a voice trying to convince passersby to play “I spy”, and Deόiridh ended up with her own Hawke story. Remember when Hawke popped out of a rift?

 


End file.
